Soothing Touch
by Silverhare
Summary: Ahiru is more than happy to comfort Fakir after a bad dream.


There were bad dreams, and then there were _nightmares._ Fakir was currently experiencing one of the latter.

He was back in that house, writing against his will – somehow, the part of his subconscious that inflicted these nighttime visions on him had never forgotten the layout or the sound of Drosselmeyer's cruel laugh, where his conscious mind had mercifully allowed him to hide those memories away. It was exactly as it was all those years ago, down to every last detail.

Except one.

In the dream, there was nothing present on the desk to allow him to stop himself from writing, to break Drosselmeyer's hold over him. Instead, he was forced to watch as Ahiru walked deeper and deeper into the Lake of Despair; he wasn't able to end the story that put her there, never danced with her, never brought her out of its depths. She drowned so that she might be able to relinquish the pendant and…

… whatever happened next, he never knew, because the sheer sickening terror of watching her die while being helpless to stop himself from writing her death was always enough to wake him up, and it was no different this time. He awoke with a jerk that shook the whole bed and sat up, his heart pounding and a cold sweat forming on his skin. Beside him, Ahiru stirred and opened her eyes.

"Fakir?" She blinked sleepily, and as her eyes adjusted to the darkness she saw that he was sitting up. Her heart sank instantly – she knew what that meant. She pulled herself up to sit next to him. He was shaking, and she gently touched his shoulder so as not to startle him. "You were having another one, weren't you?"

"… Yeah." He turned just enough to face her, and pulled her into an embrace. She was so used to this that she didn't even quack in surprise – he'd been plagued by all manner of unpleasant dreams for years.

"What was it about?" Ahiru slipped her arms around him. "The raven again?"

"No. It was about you. I wasn't able to…" His throat closed on the words, and it took him a moment to be able to speak again. "Drosselmeyer won. He made me… you…" He stopped again. He couldn't bear to say it out loud, as if that would make it real, as though his power could work through oral storytelling and not just the written word.

"Shhhh." Ahiru stroked his hair and shook her head. "It was just a dream, Fakir. I'm right here and I'm not going anywhere. Just – just try and forget about it, cause it wasn't real and it didn't happen that way, and you know that. You came and got me and we gave the story a happy ending. Together."

"Yeah, I know." He closed his eyes and let his breath out. Her arms tightened around him, and he forced himself to refocus his attention away from the images still haunting his brain and onto more tactile things, like the softness of her skin and the warmth of her embrace. She continued to stroke his hair, and rubbed her hand up and down his back, and he could feel her breathing against him, the steady rhythm helping to soothe the tension still curled up inside him.

As they continued to hold each other, though, it became a different yet still very welcome sort of comfort, the chill hanging over him turning to warmth at the touch of her fingers in his hair, on his skin. "Ahiru…"

"Hmmm? Oh!" Ahiru gasped as Fakir pressed a soft kiss against her neck. He kissed her again, and she let out a shaky sigh. "Fakir…"

"Is it all right?" he asked as he pulled back just enough to look at her. She nodded.

"Of course." She cupped his face in one hand and leaned up to kiss him. There was something akin to desperation in the way he returned the kiss, and he was trembling in her arms. She tightened her grip on him as if to show him that she was real, that this wasn't another dream. He responded by holding her even tighter, and his tongue slipped between her lips to meet hers, drawing a muffled moan from her.

When they parted for air, she moved onto his lap, straddling him. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him into another hungry kiss, leaning her body into his. One of his hands slid up her back to caress the bare skin exposed by her flimsy nightgown, pulling one of the sleeves down around her arm. She made a fluttery little humming noise as she kissed him, and threaded her fingers into his hair before breaking off the kiss. Her other hand wandered down to slowly trace over his chest as she leaned forward and took his earlobe between her lips. She tugged gently at it, her tongue flicking out to lick the tip, and he let out a shuddering groan.

"Ahiru…" Her name was a hoarse whisper as she continued to lavish kisses on his throat, sucking ever so lightly on it in spots and exhaling her warm breath onto the damp spots left behind. She left a trail of wet kisses along his collarbone and over his shoulder, and made him shiver in anticipation of when she would dart her tongue out next to softly lick his skin. Her hand continued to wander lower, until it slipped between his legs to cup him where he was beginning to get hard. She rubbed her thumb slowly along the shaft, and he moaned. "God… oh god, Ahiru…"

"Mmmm…" She smiled at him in the dark as she slid her hand back up his body, delighting in the feel of his skin beneath her fingertips. One of his hands crept up her side and cupped her breast, teasing her nipple through the thin fabric of her nightgown. She arched into his touch, moaning. "Oh… oh, _Fakir_…"

He bent his head to kiss her neck, and brought his other hand down from her shoulder to hold her other breast. Her nipples hardened under his fingers, and he rubbed his thumbs over them in a languid, circular motion that had her whimpering and clutching at his hair. He pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the base of her throat, letting the tip of his tongue brush against her skin, before letting go of her and moving his hands to where her nightgown was bunched around her waist. She eagerly shed it with his help, and tossed it over her shoulder. It had barely hit the floor when Fakir leaned her back and bent his head to kiss her breasts. Her head fell back and she cried out in pleasure as he took her nipple between his lips and sucked on it, tugging just a little and swirling his tongue over the tip. He slid his hand up her thigh and into her underwear as he gave the same attention to her other breast, his fingers firmly stroking the sensitive spot just below her mound and leaving her gasping and writhing against him.

"Fakir…" Ahiru moaned as he trailed kisses over her stomach and then moved back up to kiss her shoulder, pulling her close again. He kissed his way up her throat, his free hand sliding up her back to delicately stroke the back of her neck as he pressed his lips against her jaw and then her earlobe. She could feel his erection between her legs, and he shifted his hips to push it against her, gasping at the contact. Wanting more, she gently took hold of him and rubbed the head against her clitoris, pulling loud moans from them both. "Ah… _ah_…"

"Ahiru…" Fakir grasped at her with shaking hands, pulling almost desperately at her panties. She let go of him and moved back so that he could remove them, kicking them off somewhere into the darkened room; neither one of them cared where they landed right now. She leaned back over him to help him shed his boxers, drawing another moan from him at the friction of the fabric as she pulled it over the length of him.

He sat back on the bed once they'd both removed the last of what little clothing they'd been wearing, and took hold of her hips to help position her as she climbed onto him. He groaned again as he entered her, and heard her gasp as she wrapped her legs around his waist. He braced himself against the bed with his hands as he began to move, rocking a little with each thrust into her. Ahiru moaned, tensing the muscles in her legs to better grip him with as she moved with him, pushing her body against his and matching his rhythm. Fakir pressed his face into her shoulder as he gradually sped up, moaning and breathing heavily onto her skin. She wrapped her arms around him and held him close as she rode him, the sound of the creaking mattress lost underneath their panting and moaning. She threw her head back and screamed as she reached her climax, ecstasy flooding through her, and the sound of her release was enough to bring him the rest of the way to orgasm too, gasping and shaking so hard he nearly lost his grip on the bed. He somehow managed not to fall over, and grasped weakly at her hips to move her so he could pull out. She felt boneless and limp in the aftermath of their passion, but managed to carefully extricate herself from him nevertheless.

Once he'd pulled out of her, Fakir slumped back onto the pillows, still catching his breath. Ahiru lay down beside him, curling up on her side as she too waited for her breathing to normalize. Once he felt able to move, he rolled over onto his side to face her, and took one of her hands in his while slipping the other around her waist to pull her close. Ahiru sighed happily and snuggled into him, pulling the sheets over them both. He leaned his head against hers and moved his hand up to stroke her hair, pressing a tender kiss against the top of her head. They laid there for some time, just holding each other in the afterglow, spent and contented.

"I love you," he murmured after a while, giving her hand a soft squeeze. "I'm not going anywhere either."

"I know," she said sleepily as she put her other arm around him. "I know you're not, any more than I am." She kissed his hand before closing her eyes. "I love you too. Goodnight, Fakir."

He whispered her name again, and closed his eyes, and they both slept soundly and dreamlessly till dawn.


End file.
